


Eidolia

by hoarous



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Gen, Genii Loci, Post-Trespasser, Solas gets dumped by a castle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-17
Updated: 2017-04-17
Packaged: 2018-10-19 22:34:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10649442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoarous/pseuds/hoarous
Summary: It turns away from the parapets of its watchtower, and Solas’s breath catches: the semblance it now bears is not Mythal, but the Inquisitor. Even the simple robes it had been wearing a moment before, in the space of his inattention, have shifted into scale and dragon bone armor.“You've changed,” he says.“Have I,” says Skyhold, “or have you?”





	Eidolia

**Author's Note:**

> Some plurk friends and I were speculating the other day that Skyhold might have a "vanishing shop" type geas on it--that is to say, it can only be found by certain people under certain conditions, and can make itself unreachable and possibly even disappear entirely if it feels like it. This fic is an exploration of that premise. And also the idea of Solas accidentally locking himself out by this mechanism.
> 
> The Inquisitor referenced in this fic has high approval with Solas, but is otherwise largely unspecific.

“Hello, old friend,” says Solas.

“Hello, Solas,” says Tarasyl’an Te’las.

On very rare occasion, the fortress manifests itself in the Fade as a person. Once, it was as hazy and undefined as most anthropomorphized spirits tend to be, but Mythal’s death had changed it, as it had changed them all; since then, it has always worn her face whenever it appears to him in this form. After Solas had left Skyhold the last time--on the occasion of his departure from the Inquisition--it found him in the Fade to bid him farewell from Mythal’s lips, in Mythal’s voice. 

It turns away from the parapets of its watchtower, and Solas’s breath catches: the semblance it now bears is not Mythal, but the Inquisitor. Even the simple robes it had been wearing a moment before, in the space of his inattention, have shifted into scale and dragon bone armor. 

“You've changed,” he says.

“Have I,” says Skyhold, “or have you?”

“I suppose that is a fair question,” says Solas. He hesitates. Though their last reunion had been after centuries of separation, this one feels almost as though his absence has been longer. 

“You came to ask something of me,” says Skyhold. 

“Yes,” says Solas. 

“So ask.”

There is no sense of hastiness about the spirit--the elgaren lethalas, the spirits who embody the sacred places, are alike in the endless patience that is part of their nature as eternal watchers. It does not harry him; rather, it offers permission.

At length, Solas says, “Some of my scouts report that they are no longer able to reach you in the waking world.”

“Yes,” says the spirit. The Inquisitor’s face as worn by Skyhold is serene, impassive. 

“Why?”

“You relinquished your mastery of me,” says Skyhold. “In deed--and now, in word as well.”

“I never thought myself your master,” says Solas. “Your will is and has ever been your own.”

“Nevertheless,” it says. “My will is my own, and that was what I chose; now, I choose again.”

Solas had, in truth, suspected that his recent confrontation with the Inquisitor was at the root of this. Still, there is another question that pulls him here--one that he dared not test in the waking world, for fear of the answer. 

Such things are easier for him, here in the Fade. 

“Were I to seek you in the waking world myself,” he says, “then--would I reach you?”

It does not respond, but the sadness in its expression tells him what he needs to know. Solas bows his head.

This, too, he had suspected; he had only hoped otherwise.

“Why?” he asks, again.

Skyhold still does not speak for a time, only studying his face, or perhaps his soul. 

Then it reaches out to him, and they are standing in the garden. 

“Come,” it says. “See what you may see.”

Solas takes the spirit’s proffered hands.

… and his consciousness stretches out into the vast, numinous space of its domain. In the dream, Skyhold appears as it does in the waking world--Inquisition colors flying proudly, recent repairs standing out in their newness from the rest of the structure. The great hall with its spiked throne, the rotunda with his frescoes, the undercroft with its multitude of equipment and curiosities. The barracks and the tavern across from it, and between them, the training yard and infirmary; down below, the triage tents, the colorful merchant carts, and the stables, modified to accommodate their surpassingly eclectic stock. The lives of individual people are too blurred by movement and activity to register properly, but the impressions are there all the same--joy and sorrow, triumph and grief, love and fear and all the vibrant clamor of the living. Interwoven through it all was the light and protection of the castle. 

As Solas’s awareness reaches the outer fortifications, Skyhold begins to change.

The newer additions begin to disappear first--the statuary in the gardens, the squat bulk of the infirmary, the drapery in the great hall, the repairs to the interior walls. Before long, the castle has reverted to the state it was in when the Inquisition found it, and the breath of the living fades from its halls. 

But it doesn't stop there. Crumbled masonry heals, weeds and climbing plants recede, toppled structures right themselves--and Skyhold is whole again, though different in ways both subtle and significant. Life comes rushing back, and persists awhile. Then another generation of repairs falls away, and the castle stands once more a ruin, echoing and empty. 

The changes continue apace for several such cycles. Walls rise and fall, heraldry in a multitude of colors flickers in and out of existence. The bones of the castle remain ever-constant, but the specifics of its construction change--a closed room becomes an open atrium, a solid wall acquires a door--and the details of decoration vary wildly in form, color, and culture. The press of life swells and recedes like the tide, or like a vast, slow heartbeat. 

Eventually, the shape of Tarasyl’an Te’las--the original elven fortress, as it had been when the Dread Wolf’s forces held it--resolves, and the reversal of time begins to slow. The casting of the Veil crests the horizon of the outside world and converges on the castle proper, water rushing backwards through a floodgate. As it shrinks inwards to its source, crooked foundations straighten like soldiers called to attention. 

Solas watches his own wolf’s-head banners flare into existence, bringing the air of the old rebellion with them. He anticipated that this was coming, and yet he finds himself unprepared for how raw and real it is: fear and desperation, faith and bold defiance, all hauntingly familiar. 

And hope. 

Worst of all, the hope. The light that is innate to Skyhold--that every generation of inhabitants in turn brought with them, and found amplified and reflected back by the very soul of the land. The Skyhold of the present, he realizes, has grown steady and resonant in its maturation, strengthened and honed by generation after generation of rediscovery and reaffirmation. Tarasyl'an Te’las in its youth, drinking as it did of the brittle aspirations of that first rebellion, was a sharp, angry thing by comparison. The memory of his own hope is keener still as it reaches him: a ferocious brilliance that once cut through the darkness just as it now cuts through him, cleaving him open to the soul. 

Then the banners disappear. The pressure eases. The castle folds itself away into its foundations until, at last, the mountain seems as bare and unremarkable as any other in the vicinity, save for the two small figures clasping hands at its peak; save for a nascent yearning to become, heavy like a charge in the air. 

Solas opens his eyes and the spirit releases him, saying nothing. He raises a hand to his face and finds it wet with tears. 

Tarasyl'an Te’las looks at him sadly. It no longer looks like anyone at all--an unfinished sketch of a person, gender and species indeterminate. It lets him simply breathe and remember for awhile before it speaks again. 

“Do you recall,” it says, “when you first found me?”

Solas swallows, trying to wet his throat.

“Yes,” he whispers. He had been on the run, guiding a band of newly-escaped slaves from Andruil’s holdings. They had been pushed out from the tightly-patrolled eluvian paths and forced to flee through the unclaimed wilderness of the physical world. There had been nothing here at the time, no castle or even natural shelter of any kind--only the wild young spirit of the land, newly aware and full of light and promise.

Natural elgaren lethalas--those that rise spontaneously from the untamed wilds rather than being called forth by the presence of people--are beyond rare. It was the welcome of such a spirit that had inspired Solas to build his stronghold where he did: here, he knew, his people would be safe. 

“Do you remember what you asked of me, back then?” says the spirit.

He does. 

“Watch over them,” he says, as he had said so long ago. “Protect the people. One day, we will all be free.”

It inclines its head in acknowledgement. “And in those words, I found my purpose. It has shaped me ever since. From this, I built the geas that guards my borders: and it welcomes those who serve the people; yet refuses what would bring them harm, that such might seek me endlessly and never reach my gates.”

“I serve the people still,” Solas protests.

“You serve your people, as you ever have,” the spirit says gently. To Solas’s eyes, its resemblance to the Inquisitor is starting to return. “When Elvhenan was shattered, I remained, and saw the unfamiliar children rise to heal the wounded land. I watched them as they struggled, granting shelter as I could. So much had changed since I displayed your colors--the world was ever-changing, after that. My people lost me many times; and yet, some kindred soul would always rediscover me. The ones who flee from tyranny, yet stand defiant even weak and wounded so--such souls arise from every age and blood. What could I do but offer my protection every time?”

Whether the question is rhetorical or not, Solas finds himself unable to speak. 

After a moment, the spirit continues, “For this, I make my choice: I claim all peoples as my own. And one day, we will all be free--Elvhen or otherwise. Until that comes to pass, I stand for them.”

And here, Solas knows, is the core of Skyhold’s nature as a spirit. It is protection, of course, as is any spirit so deeply identified with a physical place; but more than that, it is this wild, audacious hope. It is the single thread that has tied together all the mismatched rabble of dreamers, refugees, and revolutionaries ever sheltered by its walls--generation after generation, world after remade world. This is the patience of a spirit of the land: Skyhold would outwait a thousand cataclysms, outlast a thousand broken empires to see its promise fulfilled. 

One day, we will all be free. 

It keeps faithfully to the heart of its original purpose, unadulterated by the passage of time, the sting of regret. 

The spirit of Skyhold reaches out to wipe the wetness from Solas’s face. “The world grew strange and new, my dreamer, as you slept--and so I grew and changed as well. The geas you gifted to my borders still holds strong, but we no longer truly share a purpose. I am sorry.”

Its touch is warm and comforting. Solas pulls away, shaking his head. 

“I cannot abandon my path,” he says.

“I know,” it replies. It looks at him with the Inquisitor’s face, and there is no anger or accusation there--only sadness. It is a painfully familiar sight. 

Solas wants to ask if they might ever meet again, whether here or in the physical world. But Skyhold has no more foreknowledge of the future than he. Its affirmation of the Inquisitor’s mastery has strengthened and focused the geas; now, without the Inquisitor’s blessing, the only way Solas could reach Skyhold again is if their purposes were to align once more. He will not diminish the significance of its choice any more than he would shed the weight of his own. 

Another treasured friendship lost to the consequences of his ancient folly. There is nothing more that he can say. 

Solas leaves the dream of the quiescent mountaintop behind, the lantern-eyed image of the Inquisitor watching him go.


End file.
